Splendor
by NortheasternWind
Summary: It's Christmas, and Autor can't see.  Apparently Ahiru has a little surprise for him.


Hey, it appears I've been working recently! ._. I'm not sure I like how this sounds, but it's Christmas, and I promised myself I'd post it by Christmas, so here it is. A present for the lovely LuckyLadybug! I love how my stuff always end with "conflict is over, pointless dialogue tiemz." It's always so hasty-sounding. And I'm not sure how well I've got the Tutu characters down. Sorry... But still, enjoy!

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"Ahiru, what are we doing?"

"You'll see!"

"That will be rather difficult while I am wearing a blindfold."

"I'll take it off, and then you'll see!"

"Why can't you take it off now?"

"Because it's a secret!"

Autor sighed as his red-headed friend dragged him through the snow-blanketed roads of Kinkan, blinded by the cloth over his eyes and tripping occasionally over an unseen lump of ice. Why in the world couldn't Ahiru just remove the blindfold and take his glasses? At least he would not have to be led through town, even if he still could not see. Or better yet, forget all this secrecy silliness and just drag him around with his vision unimpaired. It wasn't as though he knew where they were going.

"Ahiru," he said. "I'm sure we would arrive at our destination much faster if I did not need to travel at a crawl for fear of running into something."

"Well, that's why I'm holding your hand!" Ahiru said. "I can see perfectly fine. Do you think I'd lead you smack into a wall?"

She might, Autor thought, but he kept that to himself.

Christmas morning had been spent rather quietly in Autor's house, with a small breakfast and a cup of hot chocolate (he didn't particularly like it, but his parents used to make it for him every Christmas, and it was one shred of nostalgia he had trouble letting go). Not terribly to his surprise, the silence had been broken by the arrival of an enthusiastic Ahiru, who promptly ordered him to grab a coat, put on the blindfold, and follow her. Obviously he could not while blindfolded, so she was leading him instead. He rather thought he could guess where they were going by the path she was taking him.

"If we're going to Fakir's house, Ahiru, I doubt there's any need for a blindfold."

"If you didn't want to wear it, why did you agree to put it on?"

"That's a good question. I'm wondering myself." As it happened, he didn't. Ahiru had put it on him while asking permission to do so.

"We're going to end up at Fakir's house, but there's something I wanna show you first!"

"If you want to show me, then why-"

"Just be quiet and follow me, okay?"

Autor scoffed. "It's a strange holiday when Ahiru tells me to be quiet."

"Oh, pfft, very funny."

In an apparent attempt to follow her own orders, Ahiru fell silent, allowing Autor some thinking time. This really was ridiculous. Walking through town holding Ahiru's hand was bad enough- hopefully passersby would attribute what must be a blush in his cheeks to the cold- but walking through town holding Ahiru's hand while blindfolded was much worse. He did not particularly care what other people thought, but he did want to maintain some form of credibility: the respect that came with being the one who did not fool around, and knew his craft better than the rest. The pair must look awfully silly, and Autor had a feeling he would be hearing about this when he returned to school after break. This thought brought another issue to the front of the student's mind.

"Ahiru, does Fakir know where you are?" Autor asked. If Fakir heard about this at school before he heard it from Ahiru, there could be needless drama to deal with, though Autor hoped the other boy had gotten past any irrational fears regarding Autor by now.

Autor got a faceful of hair as Ahiru stopped in her tracks.

"O-ow!"

"I'll take that as a no." Autor said, bringing a hand to his teeth. Ahiru had a surprisingly hard head…

"I-It won't take long!" Ahiru said. "We'll be right there and right back, and he knows I'm at least going out to get you!"

"…Well, if you're sure." This was becoming more worrisome by the second.

"We're almost there." Ahiru promised. "Just wait, it'll be worth it!"

Autor sniffed. His nose was beginning to run. "I certainly hope so."

As the pair walked on, the air seemed to grow colder around them; the snow went deeper and deeper, and Autor was encountering more and more obstacles on the ground. Even Ahiru seemed to be stumbling more often, inevitably culminating in a startled yelp as she tripped, dragging Autor down with her.

"Eek!"

"A-Ah…!"

Well, Autor didn't have snow all over himself, but considering what he landed on instead he would not have minded that.

"That's it." Autor said resolutely, hastily pushing himself to his feet and reaching behind his head. "I'm taking this blindfold off."

"Eep!"

He tugged on the knot and it came loose with ease: apparently Ahiru wasn't very good with knots. The cloth fell from the music student's eyes, and he eased them open slowly.

"Ugh… Where…?" He frowned. Everything was a blur of white and… dark green? "Ahiru, are we even in town?"

"U-um." He turned around, and a blob of yellow with orange on top drooped. "No, we aren't."

"…Give me my glasses."

"Alright. Um, just a second…" She fell silent for a second, leading Autor to fear that she'd somehow forgotten his glasses back at home, but then she produced them from her pocket and said, "Here."

Autor reached out and took his glasses from the outstretched yellow limb, putting them on. Suddenly everything became tolerably clear: they were indeed in the forest nearby, surrounded by bare limbs and white-covered evergreens. The student turned around to look at the tracks the two of them had left, the only human influence in an otherwise pristine forest scene. It was a portion of the forest not far from the ravine, Autor knew.

"…Ahiru, why are we here?"

The duck turned girl shied. "I told you. I wanted to show you something."

"…Show me _what_?"

"Well, here." Ahiru took his hand again. "We've already come this far, haven't we?"

"Yes, I suppose we have." Autor was tempted to shake off her hand, but Ahiru was already looking a little sheepish and might take it the wrong way. "Well, let's hurry up. We can move faster now that I'm not tripping over snow."

Ahiru smiled. "Yep! Let's go!"

She recovers quickly, Autor thought. The girl led him through the forest much faster than they'd come, and it wasn't long before the two of them could see a gap in the trees ahead. That must be their destination.

"The ravine?"

"Oh, is that what you call it?" Ahiru grinned back at him. "I always thought it was called a waterfall."

"A water…?"

But it was… quiet…?

"Here we are!"

Ahiru halted at the edge of the ravine and let go of Autor's hand, allowing him to step forward cautiously and widen his eyes at the site before him. Most uncharacteristically, the entire waterfall had frozen over: two dozen feet of water sparkled magnificently in the Christmas sunlight, petrified in resplendent descent so the diverges were each their own glittering stalactite. Frost glistened on every inch of the falls, turning it into a twinkling ice sculpture. The entire rest of the forest could not compare.

"…Ahiru, how did you find this?" Autor said, deciding to ask the easier question first.

Behind him, Ahiru rubbed the back of her head. "Um, remember when I got mad at Fakir that one day? Well, I ran off into the forest, and, um, I found it."

Autor did remember. He would scold Ahiru for worrying them both like that, but both he and Fakir had already done so. "I suppose that would be why you'd completely forgotten the whole affair by the time you returned home."

"Yeah."

"…How did this happen?" Autor wondered to himself. "The water ought to be moving too fast to freeze over like this."

"That's kinda what I was wondering." Ahiru admitted. "It reminds me of that drippy faucet thing in the back of your house. The bucket we put under it to catch the water is all frozen in this huge block of ice."

"…I have to ask Charon to fix that faucet…"

"I don't think this happened last year." Ahiru went on. "So I thought maybe I'd show it to you, and then after we were done talking about how pretty it is you might know if maybe there's some sort of legend around here that might explain it."

Autor frowned. "I'll look into it. I don't know any at the moment…"

"…Oh." The ballet student smiled. "So, Autor, was it worth the trip?"

"Yes, I suppose it was." It certainly gave him something to do until New Year's came around. "But Ahiru, I have another question for you."

"Yes?"

"Why haven't you shown this to Fakir?" He frowned. "I would have thought you would have brought him here first, especially if you were going to drag me out here when you were supposed to be bringing me to his house."

"Oh…" The redhead drooped again. "I don't think Fakir would be interested…"

Autor frowned. Was this about the fight Ahiru had mentioned earlier? Apparently Ahiru had been especially talkative that day, something Autor was sure Fakir ought to be used to by now, but evidently the surly boy had shown little interest in Ahiru's chattering. When Ahiru demanded he stop being 'such a grouch,' Fakir had retorted that Ahiru ought to stop prattling about pointless things. Perhaps he had simply been in a bad mood then, or Ahiru had been feeling a little sensitive. The whole thing seemed petty and silly to Autor, but to Ahiru...?

"…So you brought me here simply because you thought I would be interested."

Ahiru bit her lip. "Well… The present I got you is kinda lame, so I figured if I took you somewhere nice, that might make up for it."

"That's what really matters." Autor said. "If you take him here because you want him to see something you consider beautiful, then I'm sure he'd appreciate it whether he was interested in whatever you brought him to see or not."

"…"

"I rather doubt a frozen waterfall would escape anyone's interest anyway."

"…Thanks, Autor." Good, she looked happier… "I'll show him on New Year's Eve! Then we can go back to his house and count down together!"

"I never saw the point of celebrating New Year's. It seems to be an excuse to throw another party."

"Why does that have to be a bad thing?"

She _does _recover quickly, Autor thought. She would be alright now.

"Nevermind." The music student cast one last glance back at the waterfall- breathtaking, fantastic, unreal- and turned back in the direction they'd came. "You said Fakir doesn't know we're here? We had better be back soon."

Ahiru's eyes widened. "Oh, I'd completely forgotten!" She turned and hurried past Autor, once again tripping and falling flat on her face. "Oof…"

"Here." Autor walked around her and held out his hand, which she took gratefully. "Don't hurt yourself."

"I won't!" She sprang up like an excited rabbit. "Come on, we have to get back and eat and open presents!"

"A warm dinner would be nice right about now." Autor agreed. "And speaking of presents, what did you get me that was so 'lame' you felt the need to drag me out to a frozen waterfall to make up for it?"

"It's a secret!"

"The last time you kept a secret, I ended up falling on top of you."

"Only because you were blindfolded!"

"Precisely. Speaking of which, why was the blindfold necessary?"

"I just wanted to blindfold you, really. I missed my chance on your birthday."

"You just…?"

"Yup."

Autor sighed. "You're making up for fourteen years of duckhood, aren't you…?"


End file.
